Windows 7 Beta

An article about pre-release versions of Windows 7 in general, including alpha, beta and release candidate builds.

Wallpapers

Builds 6758 to 7022

While build 6730 and earlier features the same wallpapers as Windows Vista, most of them were updated by build 6758, with the exception of the Light Auras wallpapers and default wallpaper (widescreen version removed). The new wallpapers were mostly licensed from Getty Images and Corbis, albeit mostly using royalty free licenses as opposed to rights-managed, likely to save licensing costs as these seem to have been intended as placeholders. By build 6910, the default wallpaper was finally replaced with a new wallpaper depicting a CGI betta fish swimming.

	Name	Category	Licensed from	Originates from	Photographer/artist	Notes
	img1	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022) Nature (builds 7048 to 7055)	Corbis	Corbis	Charles Smith
	img2	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022) Nature (builds 7048 to 7055)	Getty Images	Goodshoot	unknown (credited on Getty to Goodshoot)
	img3	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022)	Getty Images	Comstock	unknown (credited on Getty to Comstock)	Replaced with a different wallpaper in build 7048
	img4	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022) Nature (builds 7048 to 7055)	Getty Images	RubberBall	Corey Hilz
	img5	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022) Nature (builds 7048 to 7055)	Corbis	Corbis	Ted Dayton
	img6	Textures (builds 6758 to 7022) Nature (builds 7048 to 7055)	Getty Images	Getty Images	unknown (credited on Getty to PNC)
	img7	Vistas (builds 6758 to 7022) Landscapes (builds 7048 to 7055)	Getty Images	Getty Images	Peter Adams
	img8	Vistas (builds 6758 to 7022) Landscapes (builds 7048 to 7055)	Getty Images	Radius Images	unknown (credited on Getty to Radius Images)
	img9	Vistas (builds 6758 to 7022) Landscapes (builds 7048 to 7055)	Corbis	Jon Arnold Images	Peter Adams
	img10	Vistas (builds 6758 to 7022) Landscapes (builds 7048 to 7055)	Corbis	Corbis	Ronald Naar
	img11	Vistas (builds 6758 to 7022) Landscapes (builds 7048 to 7055)	Corbis	Design Pics	Carson Ganci
	img24	Vistas (builds 6429 to 6801)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Reused from Windows Vista Default wallpaper from builds 6429 to 6801
	img24	Vistas (builds 6910 to 7022)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Default wallpaper from builds 6910 to 7022
	img25	Light Auras (builds 6469 to 7022) Scenes (builds 7048 to 7055)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Reused from Windows Vista
	img26	Light Auras (builds 6469 to 7022) Scenes (builds 7048 to 7055)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Reused from Windows Vista
	img27	Light Auras (builds 6469 to 7022) Scenes (builds 7048 to 7055)	N/A	Microsoft	Robert Stein	Reused from Windows Vista
	img28	Light Auras (builds 6469 to 7022) Scenes (builds 7048 to 7055)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Reused from Windows Vista
	img29	Light Auras (builds 6469 to 7022) Scenes (builds 7048 to 7055)	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Reused from Windows Vista

Regional

A selection of regional wallpapers was introduced in build 6941. Most of these were taken by Microsoft employees, with a couple coming from Getty and Corbis. The United Kingdom and the United States themes consist of wallpapers representing their countries, while the Australia, Canada, and South Africa themes consist of the same six placeholder wallpapers unrelated to their countries, one of which is a duplicate.

Some of these were made available on Microsoft's website as downloadable wallpapers and themes (only consisting of one wallpaper) prior to Windows 7's general availability. The Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States themes were also made available, but were replaced with new ones upon 7's release. The Australia/Canada/South Africa theme was released under the name Nature; the file names have been renamed to neutral-wp# and the fifth wallpaper (a duplicate of the second) was removed.

	Name	Category	Licensed from	Originates from	Photographer/artist	Notes
	AU/CA/ZA-wp1	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	Don Turriaga	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Dusk & Dawn theme
	AU/CA/ZA-wp2	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	David Hurtado Toran	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme
	AU/CA/ZA-wp3	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	Mario Tevanian	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme and Butterflies theme
	AU/CA/ZA-wp4	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	Richard Smith	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	AU/CA/ZA-wp5	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	David Hurtado Toran	Duplicate of AU/CA/ZA-wp2
	AU/CA/ZA-wp6	Australia Canada South Africa	N/A	Microsoft	Anand Hegde	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme
	DE-wp1	Germany	Getty Images	MedioImages	unknown (credited on Getty to Medioimages)	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	DE-wp2	Germany	Getty Images	MedioImages	unknown (credited on Getty to Medioimages)
	DE-wp3	Germany	Getty Images	Westend61	Dieter Heinemann	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	DE-wp4	Germany	Getty Images	Westend61	unknown (credited on Getty to Westend61)
	DE-wp5	Germany	Getty Images	unknown	Frank Krahmer	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	DE-wp6	Germany	N/A	Microsoft	Holger Gawrisch	Later edited and reused in Microsoft's downloadable Dusk & Dawn theme
	GB-wp1	United Kingdom	Getty Images	Axiom	unknown (formerly credited on Getty to IIC/ Axiom)	Later available for download in Microsoft site
	GB-wp2	United Kingdom	N/A	Microsoft	Alfred Biehler	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme
	GB-wp3	United Kingdom	Corbis	Corbis	Kathy Collins	Later available for download in Microsoft site and reused in the downloadable Blue Water theme
	GB-wp4	United Kingdom	N/A	Microsoft	Richard Smith	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Dusk & Dawn theme
	GB-wp5	United Kingdom	N/A	Microsoft	Sam Hammami	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Community Showcase Rural Landscapes 3 theme with text at the bottom
	GB-wp6	United Kingdom	N/A	Microsoft	Mona Akmal	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Community Showcase Rural Landscapes 2 theme with text at the bottom
	JP-wp1	Japan	Corbis	Corbis	unknown (credited on Corbis to Image Plan)	Previously appeared in Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 as Reflection - GalleryPlayer and reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	JP-wp2	Japan	Masterfile	Masterfile	Ron Stroud
	JP-wp3	Japan	N/A	Microsoft	Shinobu Takahashi	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme
	JP-wp4	Japan	Getty Images	DAJ	unknown (credited on Getty to DAJ)
	JP-wp5	Japan	Corbis	Corbis	David Ball
	JP-wp6	Japan	Corbis	Dex Image	unknown (credited on Corbis to Dex Image)	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Blue Water theme
	US-wp1	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Bao Nguyen	Later available for download in Microsoft site and reused in the downloadable Community Showcase Natural Landscapes 3 theme with text at the bottom
	US-wp2	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Heidi Hopen-Wright	Later available for download in Microsoft site and reused in the downloadable Blue Water theme
	US-wp3	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Dina Taylor	Later available for download in Microsoft site and reused in the downloadable Dusk & Dawn theme
	US-wp4	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Bill Luan	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Dusk & Dawn theme
	US-wp5	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Anand Hegde	Later reused in Microsoft's downloadable Flowers & Foliage theme and Community Showcase Rural Landscapes 2 theme with text at the bottom
	US-wp6	United States	N/A	Microsoft	Anand Hegde

Builds 7048 to 7055

Eventually, more themes would be added. The wallpapers from the new themes primarily came from Microsoft employees. With the exception of img3 which was replaced with a different one, all of the other wallpapers from previous builds would stay until build 7057. The default wallpaper is slightly changed, where the blue aurora background has a softer, brighter appearance while the fish and bubbles have been slightly moved to the left.

	Name	Category	Licensed from	Originates from	Photographer/artist	Notes
	img0	Windows	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Default wallpaper from builds 7048 to 7231 Slightly different from img24 from the earlier builds
	img0	Windows	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	Default wallpaper in the Starter edition from builds 7062 to 7231
	img3	Nature	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement	Replaces the previous img3
	img12	Landscapes	N/A	Microsoft	Jonathan Wiedemann
	img13	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Tom Alphin
	img14	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Jonathan Wiedemann
	img15	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement
	img16	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Jonathan Wiedemann
	img17	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement
	img18	Architecture	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement
	img19	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Tom Alphin
	img20	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Tom Alphin
	img21	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement
	img22	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement
	img23	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Tom Alphin
	img24	Characters	N/A	Microsoft	Stephen Hoefnagels
	img30	Scenes	N/A	Microsoft	Manuel Clement	At 1920x1440 akin to the other Light Auras/Scenes wallpapers

Build 7057 onwards

At this point, the wallpapers are identical to the final release, with the exception of the default wallpaper, which would be eventually replaced with the final variant in build 7232.

Sample pictures

[todo: identify builds sample pictures were introduced/removed in]

While earlier builds featured the same selection of sample pictures as Windows Vista, they were eventually removed. Eight new sample pictures were introduced in build 69xx. Details about them are unknown, although it is known that all of them were taken by Microsoft employees. Oddly a few of these are at non-4:3 aspect ratios, similar to Windows XP Media Center Edition's new sample pictures. By build 70xx, these were replaced with the same sample pictures that appear in the final release, except Desert is at 1280x960 rather than 1024x768.

	Name	Rating	Licensed from	Originates from	Photographer/artist	Notes
	Butterfly	4 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown
	Field	5 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown
	Flower	3 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown
	Leaves	3 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	At 1024x724
	Rocks	4 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	At 1024x682
	Tulip	4 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown	At 1024x683
	Waterfall	5 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown
	Window	4 Stars	N/A	Microsoft	unknown

User account pictures

Windows 7 used the same user account pictures as Vista until build 7055, where it introduced all of the new user account pictures that appear in the final release.

Logon backgrounds

Windows 7 used the same logon background as Vista until build 6776, where it switched to using white strokes of light over a teal background. Like the Vista logon background, it is included at many different resolutions, including vertical ones. This was replaced by a completely different background from build 7055 onwards, designed by Chuck Anderson and Erik Attkisson.

Setup and OOBE backgrounds

Until build 6776, 7 used the same setup background as Vista Service Pack 1, and the same OOBE background as both Vista RTM and SP1. By build 6776, both the setup and OOBE backgrounds were switched to the above-mentioned background except that the resolution for the setup background is 1024x768. The OOBE background was replaced by the RTM logon screen background from build 7055 onwards, and the setup background was replaced by a darker variant of the aforementioned image from build 7068 onwards.